Europe insists on Arafat's authority

[Chris Burford <cburford@xxxxxxxxxx>]

Although in code, further evidence of the sharpness of the conflicts
between the USA and Europe.

While Bush lets Sharon strip Arafat naked of virtually everything but the
clothes he stands up in, Solana, former head of Nato during the Kosovo war,
signals through his spokeswoman that Arafat remains for Europe the
responsible representative of the Palestinian people.

The British foreign office typically straddles the two continents, but its
statement is also consistent with the European position, since it knows
from Northern Ireland that terrorism cannot be defeated by military means.

Meanwhile Bush is sympathising with a regime of full occupation, and terror
against all Palestinians willing to resist militarily or by terroristic
means. Yet Wesley Clark, inteviewed on CNN last night, said that all war
game models of this sort of confrontation end up with the protagonists
negotiating.

Europe is right about the management of conflict. But even more a lot of
money is at stake: the GNP of the islamic world. Europe will continue to
fight more assertively against the USA. Only the nature of globalisation
require its methods of fighting to be muted.

Chris Burford

London



> Europe insists on Arafat's status as a legitimate authority
>
> Brian Whitaker Saturday March 30, 2002 The Guardian
>
> As Israel declared Yasser Arafat an enemy and sent tanks crashing into his
> headquarters yesterday, Europe insisted that he was still a legitimate
> authority and a partner for peace.
>
> "Arafat is our interlocutor ... he remains our interlocutor and the
> legitimate authority," said a spokeswoman for the EU foreign policy chief,
> Javier Solana.
>
> Israel had a legitimate right to fight terrorism, but "military means are
> not going to solve the problem of terrorism," the spokeswoman said.
>
> In telephone calls to the Palestinian leader and Israeli foreign minister
> Simon Peres, Mr Solana pressed for a ceasefire and urged both sides to
> seize the opportunity offered by the Arab summit's endorsement of Saudi
> peace proposals earlier this week.
>
> EU diplomats said that in negotiations with US envoy Anthony Zinni the two
> sides had only been one sentence away from a ceasefire deal before the
> suicide bombing in Netanya Wednesday.
>
> The French foreign minister, Hubert Vedrine, yesterday criticised Israel's
> effort to "asphyxiate Arafat," saying it would not lead to a solution to
> the country's security problems.
>
> In Britain, the Foreign Office urged Israel "to choose restraint rather
> than revenge." A spokesman added: "We unreservedly condemn suicide
> bombings and urge the Palestinian Authority to do all it can to prevent
> such atrocities."